Leech

Leech or Leecher is an Internet slang term for someone who deliberately benefits from other's information without offering anything in return. The name derives from the leech, a blood sucking animal that acts as a parasite.

Examples of a leech.

Wireless Internet Leeches - Wi-Fi leeches search out and find open wireless network access points and access them without the owner's knowledge or permission in order to access the Internet for free. Examples of this are neighbors who will intentionally attach to their neighbors wireless network and receive their Internet access through them. This sort of leeching has been the topic of several legal debates lately.

Direct Linking - Direct Linking is a form of bandwidth leeching in which the leech places an unauthorized linked objects, often images, from one web page onto another.

P2P Leeching - Often found in the BitTorrent community, a P2P leech will download the data offered, and not share their upload with the rest of the community to benefit the entire swarm.

In related terms with BitTorrent, a leech is also simply someone who does not possess the entire file that is being offered. Therefore, all BitTorrent downloaders are leechers and once they have the completed file, should they choose to leave their BitTorrent client connected, they then graduate to a seeder. The negative sense of this term comes to play when the downloader disconnects as soon as they are done downloading the file.

Related Guides

Using and Maxing Out Speeds With uTorrent- This is an extensive, but simple to follow guide, for using uTorrent (aka µTorrent) , a very powerful BitTorrent client. By following each of the steps in this guide, you will be able to max out downloading speeds for your connection.

Guide to using Vuze (Azureus 3.0) (BitTorrent Client)- This is a guide to using Azureus a BT client. If you are not familiar with Bit Torrent, don't worry the first part of this guide explains it. This guide will teach you how to use Azureus to download files and will show you some of the features the client.

BitTorrent FAQ- This small FAQ explains some of the questions rised by BitTorrent -- the P2P content distribution system.